Construction for overcrowded Freehold Learning Center is underway

'How can these poor kids concentrate?' Assemblywoman Joann Downey recalls the overcrowding at the Freehold Learning Center and says she is hopeful for the future of the school building.
Video by Steph Solis, @stephmsolis

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The Freehold Borough K-8 school district started construction on the Freehold Learning Center. When completed, it is expected to include three additions, a new fire alarm and other upgrades.(Photo: Steph Solis/Asbury Park Press)Buy Photo

FREEHOLD BOROUGH - The one-room school for Freehold Learning Center, partitioned with boxes and dividers to separate classes, may be a thing of the past.

"I was watching some fifth graders try and read a book report, and I thought to myself, 'how do these poor kids concentrate?'" Assemblywoman Joann Downey recalled Tuesday afternoon at the ceremonial groundbreaking for the Freehold Learning Center construction.

She added: "I feel so proud to be with all of you knowing that a lot of people worked really hard. And, yes, this is what happens when you stick to something, you're persistent and you're determined and you work hard to make something that's right happen."

The Freehold Learning Center, which serves students grades kindergarten through third grade, has an open-space classroom concept. In the 1970s, it was considered an avante-garde experiment for the less crowded school. Today, it means hundreds of students are crammed into partitioned section of a single room, functioning as a separate classroom.

District officials, parents and politicians like Downey said they thought the Freehold Borough Schools expansion project to alleviate overcrowding would never happen. Then came last month's groundbreaking for the Park Avenue complex, which houses the elementary and middle schools.

“This is the end of the beginning,” said Superintendent Rocco Tomazic, who with teachers and parents spent years lobbying for expansions in the underfunded district.

Newport Construction won the bid the renovations at $8,387,000, roughly $5 million under budget, according to a statement from the district. They already started construction and expect all the projects to be completed by December 2018, Tomazic said.

He said the project will transform the one-room building, once considered an experimental open space plan. The project expands the building by nearly 20,000 square feet and brings several upgrades, including a new fire alarm system, a new cafeteria, a new entrance driveway, three new playground areas and an enlarged parking lot.

It took school officials three years to get the construction projects off the ground. The projects were proposed in two bond measures, which voters rejected. Then the district appealed, leading to a review by an administrative law judge. The judge ruled in 2015 in favor of the district, ordering the bonds and overruling the votes.

Parents, school officials and politicians such as state Sen. Jennifer Beck, Assemblyman Eric Houghtaling and Downey continued to lobby for increased funding and approval on the construction projects.

The proposal finally got the green light in August 2016 after then-Commissioner of Education David C. Hespe announced he would approve the project and that the state would pay 85 percent of the cost.

Sen. Jen Beck: This building is going to be “a fabulous monument of the passion” residents showed in rallying for more funding and resources in Trenton. pic.twitter.com/Psv9WgEyph

The project had to be approved by numerous state agencies, including the Department of Community affairs, state Department of Education and, because of wetlands on the property, the Department of Environmental Protection.

The district remains one of the most underfunded in the state having received $12 million less than it's entitled to under the school funding formula before receiving $955,000 back after the government shutdown this summer. The school also filed a lawsuit against the state earlier this year over the funding levels.

District and state officials all said they don't believe the fight for more funding and increased resources is over

"This is an exciting time for the borough to have our schools renovated and expanded," said Mayor J. Nolan Higgins, adding that "for everyone who has advocated for our students, today is the day."